They stood as signals to the land, This seraph-band each waved his hand, No voice; but, Ö, the silence sank But soon I heard the dash of oars, My head was turned perforce away, The pilot and the pilot's boy, Dear Lord in heaven, it was a joy I saw a third, I heard his voice ; It is the hermit good! He singeth loud his godly hymns That he makes in the wood. He'll shrieve my soul, he 'll wash away PART VII. THIS hermit good lives in that wood That come from a far countree. He kneels at morn, and noon, and eve, – K The hermit It is the moss that wholly hides The skiff-boat neared: I heard them talk, 66 Why, this is strange, I trow! Where are those lights so many and fair, Approach- "Strange, by my faith!" the hermit said, – And they answered not our cheer! ette with wonder. The ship suddenly sinketh. The planks look warped! and see those sails, I never saw aught like to them, Unless perchance it were "Brown skeletons of leaves that lag My forest-brook along; When the ivy-tod is heavy with snow, And the owlet whoops to the wolf below, "Dear Lord! it hath a fiendish look," The pilot made reply; "I am a-feared.". "Push on, push on!" Said the hermit cheerily. The boat came closer to the ship, But I nor spake nor stirred; The boat came close beneath the ship, Under the water it rumbled on, It reached the ship, it split the bay ; Stunned by that loud and dreadful sound, Like one that hath been seven days drowned, My body lay afloat; But, swift as dreams, myself I found Upon the whirl, where sank the ship, I moved my lips, the pilot shrieked, The holy hermit raised his eyes, I took the oars: the pilot's boy, Laughed loud and long, and all the while "Ha! ha!" quoth he, "full plain I see, The Devil knows how to row.' And now, all in my own countree, I stood on the firm land; The hermit stepped forth from the boat, The ancient mariner is saved in the pilot's boat. "O, shrieve me, shrieve me, holy man The hermit crossed his brow. ! 66 Say quick," quoth he, "I bid thee say What manner of man art thou?" Forthwith this frame of mine was wrenched The ancient mariner earnestly entreateth the hermit to shrieve him; and the penance of life falls on him: And ever and anon, Which forced me to begin my tale; Since then, at an uncertain hour, throughout That agony returns: hie future life, an ago ny constraineth him to trav el from land to land, And till my ghastly tale is told, I pass like night from land to land; What loud uproar bursts from that door! But in the garden bower the bride O wedding-guest! this soul hath been So lonely 't was, that God himself O, sweeter than the marriage-feast, To walk together to the kirk, - While each to his great Father bends, Farewell, farewell! but this I tell He prayeth best who loveth best The mariner, whose eye is bright, He went like one that hath been stunned A sadder and a wiser man And to teach, by his own exam ple, love and reverence to all things that God made and loveth. MIRABEAU.- Sterling. Nor oft has peopled Earth sent up A greater power had fled away Than aught that now remained behind. The scathed and haggard face of will, And look so strong with weaponed thought, Had been to many million hearts The All between themselves and naught; |